OEM and Retail

What's the difference between an OEM and Retail version of Vista? I know that an OEM version is the one the computer manufactor gives to you, but is there a real difference?

Hi Rhystic1, and welcome to the vista forums

The basic difference is in the licensing. an OEM copy of vista is not transferable to a different computer than the one it was sold for.

With the big manufacturers you may also find that you do not receive a disk that can repair / re-install the operating system, but a recovery partition which will restore things to how they were when the PC left the factory.

With a Retail copy of Vista you can install onto a different PC if you wish ( of course only one copy may be used at a time so you are required to remove the original install ).

The retail copy also allows for replacement media deals from MS, (as far as i am aware this is not available with OEM), such as the upgrade from 32 to 64 bit versions for the cost of shipping only (currently $10)

hope this helps

Thank you,
I currently own a Retail version of Ultimate, but I wanted to know what OEM stood for.

And OEM stands for Dell, HP etc.

mansrm81 said:

And OEM stands for Dell, HP etc.

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Then what would you call this?

Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate SP1 32-bit English 1pk for System Builders DSP OEI DVD - Operating Systems

I was saying those are another example of what OEM stands for.

Hi Rhystic1

OEM = Original Equipment Manufacturer.

which is generally taken to mean the likes of Dell, HP, Acer, and the like. Disks are available on the market, legitimately for use by the smaller companies who assemble PC's. These are exactly the same as far as the software is concerned and are often available at a lower price than the retail disks so may look attractive. The differences in licence and the fact that the manufacturer is responsible for supporting the systems has to be taken in account of course.

The differences in licence and the fact that the manufacturer is responsible for supporting the systems has to be taken in account of course.

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Or if you by one like I linked to above you are now the system builder and responsible for support. Then again that is no big deal as if you have a problem you can't solve there are always forums like this one to ask for help. That and you will probably get better and faster responses than if you asked Microsoft directly (definitely better and faster than Dell/HP/etc).